Cervical collars are worn by patients who have suffered neck injuries to aid the patient in holding his head relatively stationary. By minimizing the tendency of a person to turn or twist his neck, the injury will heal in a shorter time than would be the case in the absence of such support.
Known cervical collars generally include a soft pliable foam material incorporating a curved metal band buried within the material to hold it in an annular configuration and exert a bias force when the rear opposed ends of the collar are separated to fit the same about the patient's neck. Generally the collars are of fairly uniform cross section throughout their annular configuration the same being somewhat similar to a short cylindrical or tubular section.
Since patients have different neck lengths, it is not uncommon practice to provide the collars of varying axial extent so that the patient's lower jaw and side head portions will be properly supported. This requirement of providing different sized collars has disadvantages in that only a certain sized collar will fit certain patients. In other words, any given collar available in the prior art is not really universal.
Other problems associated with available cervical collars relate to the general discomfort of a patient because of the uniform cross sectional shaping of the collar itself. Proper cradling of the lower jaw and the side areas of the head is thus lacking to a large degree. Further, the available collars tend to become dirty with use and their normally bland white color renders them conspicuous on a patient and not particularly attractive from an aesthetic standpoint.